Star Factor

2/06/2012 12:01 AM Eastern

By: By MCN Staff

Bill O’Reilly was present at Fox News Channel’s creation, with his show originally airing asThe O’Reilly Report. A veteran local-station and network newsman and anchor, O’Reillyturned around the floundering syndicated newsmagazine Inside Edition before attendingHarvard University and then joining FNC, where his smarts, toughness and strong opinionshave turned the show, since renamed The O’Reilly Factor, into cable news’ top-ratedshow since March 2001. O’Reilly, in a recent interview with Multichannel News online editorMike Reynolds, looked back at what has made the Factor into a TV icon, FNC’s perchatop the cable news sector, what lies ahead in the November election and his future.

MCN: To what depth has the networksucceeded on the principles laid out byRoger Ailes’ initial mission statement ofattracting more viewers by presenting facts,by being fair and balanced?

Bill O’Reilly: I see a huge difference betweenFox News’ presentation and the presentationon our competition, CNN andMSNBC and Headline News. And the differenceis basically more authenticity. Youknow on one network you’re getting a verystrong, left-wing, partisan approach, whichis fine, they can do what they want. Andthen the other, you’re getting the traditional,trying to be middle of the road, but a culturethat is much more liberal than traditional.

And I think that as far as the facts are concerned,there’s not much difference betweenCNN and Fox. And MSNBC doesn’t really dealin facts, so we don’t take them …

MCN: (Laughter)

O’Reilly: I’m not saying that disparagingly;they just don’t do it. They don’t have a SheppardSmith broadcast, they don’t have aBret Baier broadcast, they don’t have newsblocks throughout the day. And they don’thave correspondents of their own; they borrowNBC’s correspondents.

There’s no real difference in the factual presentationbetween Fox and CNN. It’s what storiesyou cover, what you feel is interesting toyour audience. And there is where RogerAiles’ philosophy comes into play. It’s storyselection.

MCN: Do you think many see you as theface, voice of the Fox News Channel?

O’Reilly: I know I’m famous and all of thatand, usually, the big mouths get the attentionand certainly I’m a big mouth. But Idon’t really look at it like I’m the face of thenetwork or anything like that. What I try todo is deliver a good program so that peoplewill watch it, so we’ll get high ratings and the network will prosper. I mean it’s just asimple business proposition.

MCN: The O’Reilly Factor has been thetop cable news show for 134 consecutivemonths. How do you explain your success?

O’Reilly: I’m a very competitive guy, so Iwant to win and by a huge margin. I rememberearly on, I was competing against ChrisMatthews’ Hardball on MSNBC at 8 p.m.,and I said, “We’re going to beat this guy.We’re going right after him.”

And they looked at me askance becausewe only had, at that point, maybe 50 millionsubscribers. We just didn’t have a lot of eyeballsavailable to us. I said, “Well, we’re goingto beat them.” I targeted them and I targetedLarry King in the sense that I saw his rating[and said], “We can do higher than that.” I ama competitive guy.

It’s not enough just to win the night. We haveto win the night decisively. And we’ve beenlucky enough to do it primarily because we arefocused on and know what the audience likes.But we don’t pander to the audience.

And if you lose a few, you lose a few. But thathas added to our success. And we’ve broadenedit out so that I think anybody can enjoy the program.You don’t have to be a conservative or aliberal or an independent. It’s just entertainingand informative on its own merits.

MCN: Are you surprised that Fox NewsChannel beat CNN after its first five years?

O’Reilly: I mean, it was all a matter of gettingthe channel into the homes and having peoplesample. You know, I’m a fairly confident,cocky guy.

MCN: I know.

O’Reilly: I took over a show called Inside Editionthat was going down the drain. They firedDavid Frost three weeks after he took over andthey looked at me and they said, “We’re goingto lose $50 million dollars; can you turnit around?” And I said, “Maybe. You know, itdepends on how much money you’re going tosink into it and how much latitude you’re goinggive me.” And I said, “I’ll take it over, butI have to write everything, including the promos,and get out of my way.” And we turnedthat around; and that show is still on the air.

So I’ve always been confident that I can delivera product that Americans can respond to.And I don’t change the product. If we have a badnight on Thursday, I’m not changing it on Friday.We get a game plan, we get good people — I onlyhave 15, but they’re like Navy SEALs — we executeit in a very, disciplined manner.

So I’m not surprised that the Fox NewsChannel has succeeded; I think it’s been avery disciplined operation. I think they knowthat the traditional audience, which is enormous,was underserved so Roger and the guyscame up with a formula, “We’re going to be respectfultoward traditional and conservativeAmericans, not sneering and not demeaning.And just that tone will bring them in, and thenwe’ll give them a product that they feel is worthy.”And that’s what happened.

MCN: Do you think there will be a secondObama term?

O’Reilly: Impossible to say, because the economicswill dictate how uneasy the voters feel.If the voter in November feels insecure, thenObama will lose. It really doesn’t matter whoruns against him. But if things get better andthere’s optimism in the air, then the presidentcould very well win because he’s a very, verygood campaigner. And Americans still likehim personally.

MCN: Your contract is up at the end of thisyear. How much longer do you see yourselfdoing this?